


A Merchant of Time

by babywarg (morphaileffect)



Category: Black Jack (Anime & Manga), Doctor Strange (2016), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate History, Backstory, Crossover, Gen, Major Character Injury, Manga & Anime, Minor Character Death, Short, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-20
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:07:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24287122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morphaileffect/pseuds/babywarg
Summary: I remember Black Jack mentioned in a prompt somewhere, but I can’t find it again. Can anyone point me to it? I just woke up this morning with this in my head and had to write it down.If you haven’t read Osamu Tezuka’s classicBlack Jack comicsyet - please do. The author had a solid medical background; it shone through in the sometimes fantastic stories he wrote for this iconic (anti?)hero.Some mention of death and major character injury.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	A Merchant of Time

**Author's Note:**

> I remember Black Jack mentioned in a prompt somewhere, but I can’t find it again. Can anyone point me to it? I just woke up this morning with this in my head and had to write it down.
> 
> If you haven’t read Osamu Tezuka’s classic [Black Jack comics](http://tezukainenglish.com/wp/?page_id=174) yet - please do. The author had a solid medical background; it shone through in the sometimes fantastic stories he wrote for this iconic (anti?)hero.
> 
> Some mention of death and major character injury.

The cancer was supposed to have taken Eugene Strange within a year.

But before that year was up, Eugene went on a trip. It was to see an underground doctor in Japan: a miracle worker, famous for experimental and controversial medical techniques.

His wife Beverly lost contact with him for a few days. Then, suddenly, she received a phone call from him, instructing her to wire all the money in their family’s bank account to a new account he had set up in Japan.

Beverly at first resisted. It was all their money. They had three small children.

“You don’t understand,” her husband said, his voice shaking in desperation, “this _is_ for our children. For us. I don’t want to go yet, Bev. It’s not my time.”

Beverly wept. She feared her husband had been scammed.

But she loved him. And she would do anything, if it meant there was even the slightest chance of defying fate.

So, Beverly Strange steeled herself, and did as her husband bade.

***

Two months later, Eugene Strange returned to his family in Nebraska - fully cancer-free.

But he was also changed. He was no longer the warm, funny, loving family man whom his wife knew. And whom his oldest child Stephen looked up to.

He despised the penniless state to which his family had been reduced, because of the expensive treatment that saved his life. He became obsessed with money - to the point that it seemed nothing else mattered.

He shuttled between work and his study. His family barely got to see him anymore. Young Stephen found himself having to be the “man of the house” at an early age, dealing with domestic affairs - like keeping his younger siblings in line, being strong for his mother, taking on some of the chores, speaking for the household - in ways his father couldn’t be bothered to do.

When his sister Donna died, his father wasn’t there to bury her.

Finally, the time came when Stephen had to go away to university. He wanted to see his father, at least, to say goodbye.

But his father didn’t even come out of his study to see him off.

***

Stephen wasn’t sure what drew him to medicine. There were no doctors in his family, as far as he knew. They were farmers, merchants, teachers - salt of the earth.

On the surface, it was about his sister, Donna. And all the other ways he could no longer stand feeling helpless.

But over time, he realized that it also might have been because of the doctor who had saved his father’s life.

He had never met this doctor, but the fact that his entire being was shrouded in mystery was enough to light a spark in his young mind.

Who was he? How could he have saved his father’s life, when all other doctors had given up? How come his father couldn’t speak of the procedure that had saved him, and why did he return a changed man from it?

...and what the fuck kind of name was “Black Jack”?

He toyed with the idea of looking for this doctor. Or, perhaps, meeting him at some of the medical summits or institutions he frequented.

But he knew there was little chance of that. From what he’d heard, the Japanese doctor did not even have a license to practice medicine. He was a hermit, a rogue - almost an urban legend.

Stephen might have looked up to him, because the man whom he’d loved as his father had disappeared into his obsession.

And Stephen’s propensity for charging clients exorbitant rates for lifesaving procedures...?

Well, that might have been inspired by that doctor, too.

If you could defy fate, and perform miracles beyond the abilities of ordinary humans, you had every right to ask for above-average compensation.

His father would agree. It was only fair.

***

He wasn’t supposed to survive the accident.

He was in a coma and wouldn’t wake up.

But somehow, a doctor was able to revive him. Stephen regained consciousness on that doctor’s operating table. His whole body felt heavy, though not in pain.

He could only move his eyes and his lips. He saw the doctor turn toward him. And through the haze of anaesthesia, he noticed - the man wore a medical gown that was drenched in blood. He had a skin graft on his face, over one eye.

That doctor asked him, “Do you want to live?”

What the hell kind of question was that?

“Do you want to live?” the doctor asked again.

“...Yes.” Stephen wasn’t sure the word actually escaped his lips, so he said it again, a little more loudly, “Yes.”

The doctor said, “Then you’d better be prepared for the cost.”

“Cost...?”

The doctor cited a figure.

“Can’t be serious.” Stephen wanted to laugh. He hoped he was able to.

“You don’t understand,” the doctor said. “The money you pay is for buying time. Time is not something you get more of for free. There’s always a price. A hefty one.”

As the doctor moved around the lab, getting his instruments ready (was he going to do this all alone? No - Stephen saw a little girl in a gown and cap and mask nearby, silently helping him. What was a child doing in an operating room?), he continued speaking:

“Someone who loves you heard I was in town, and thought of bringing you to me, when she realized that neither she nor any of the other doctors in your hospital could do anything. She begged me to save your hands. But it’s too late for that.”

His hands...what was that about his hands? Stephen was having a hard time following.

“Still, saving your life should be worth my asking price. Sometimes money is enough. But it seldom is.”

Stephen couldn’t understand that anymore. Staying awake meant pain had avenues to seep back in.

“How can you...be sure I’ll...pay?”

The doctor increased the amount of anaesthesia flowing into Stephen’s veins, and darkness fell.

***

Stephen would wake up in a room in the hospital where he worked - looked after by his friend and former lover, Christine.

Most of him would swiftly recover from injuries that would have been life-threatening to others, but which he would somehow managed to survive.

But not his hands. His hands would stay broken. Would never stop being in pain, never stop being a reminder of how things would never be the same.

He would hate Christine for this. Hate her for sending him to the rogue Japanese doctor who couldn’t save his hands anyway. Better to have left him to die, he said, than to have left him like this.

And it would break her heart. But he would be too heartbroken, himself, to notice.

***

The first thing he would find upon his return to his apartment was an obscenely high medical bill with no letterhead, and a bank account number in Japan. He would start selling off his expensive possessions to pay this bill.

In the end, when he was done paying, all he would have to his name was his apartment, a watch Christine had given him a long time ago, and a ton of debt. The completely untraceable bank account would be closed.

Then, Stephen would sell his apartment, use the money to look for the doctor with the two-toned face. He would travel the world, armed only with Christine’s watch and a few miserable dollars, hoping to find that doctor - or others like him, who could perform miracles. Who could save his life again.

Who could explain the very last thing he heard as he lost consciousness on that doctor’s operating table:

_“You are Eugene Strange’s son. A Strange always pays.”_


End file.
